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Iron deficiency with EI

Jaap

Member
Joined
30 Sep 2011
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1,068
Location
Nicosia
Hi

I have noticed lately that some of my plants turn white like stayrogen repens and monte carlo. I am double dosing macros and micros. Is there a chance that Iron can become low even with EI?

Thanks.
 
Is there a chance that Iron can become low even with EI?
Nope. Not with correct dosing EI, especially double dosing.

99.99999% of issues when people use EI, is poor/insufficient CO2 for your light level, which why you dose EI, to completely 100% exclude lack of nutrients being an issue.

What is your tank size, lighting and CO2 regime, please ?
 
That's nice reply, but did you hear about precipitation issues or other problems with PO4 and Fe? Why do you place blame on CO2 all the time? Right now I suffer strong PO4 deficiency in two of my plants in my tank where I add more then 3 ppm PO4 each week. But I'm quite sure you would explain it as CO2 problem.
 
Guys.. .there you go again..i think you both are right. Light and Co2 are the essencials in order for the plants aborve all other nutrients. Right? This two factor are ignition for plants do the rest. So i read over and over.

So.. if Co2 is not in good level that could be the cause for plants not absorving PO4 or another specific nutrient.

Did i say something stupid?
 
That's nice reply, but did you hear about precipitation issues or other problems with PO4 and Fe? Why do you place blame on CO2 all the time? Right now I suffer strong PO4 deficiency in two of my plants in my tank where I add more then 3 ppm PO4 each week. But I'm quite sure you would explain it as CO2 problem.

Ok Ill go ahead and say it although this isnt the thread to do so.

In my opinion the plant problems (the so called defficiencies, not algae problems) can be overcome in two ways. One is adding more CO2 and the other is adding more nutrients. i dont think its a one variable thing.

More CO2-> Plant does better at picking up nutrients
More Nutrients-> its easier for the plant to pick up nutrients and probably no need for so much CO2.
 
but did you hear about precipitation issues or other problems with PO4 and Fe
This why you dose macro & micro alternate days. If you mix macro and micro in a bottle you will get a precipitate (assuming pH is right), but due to dilution and alternate days this generally won't happen in the tank. This has been researched and measured and is not an issue in a tank.

The EI dosing levels were derived from actual measured nutrient consumption with plants exposed to over 5W/gallon and max CO2, so I seriously doubt that if you are dosing EI (especially double EI) you are having nutrient (PO4) deficiency issues.

Again all points to CO2 issues for the level of light you are using.

This is the original EI research from 2008 (and earlier).
http://www.barrreport.com/forum/barr-report/estimative-index/5053-confusion-about-ei-and-other-myths
 
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Is there a problem of dosing the tank with macro and micro on the same day on a daily basis?
They´re not mixed in the bottle.
 
As you say Ian this was done at perfect CO2 levels. Maybe if CO2 is low and you up the the nutrient, then the deficiency does not happen.

Tom Barr is suggesting that you can forget about nutrients, but is this right? I dont think it is black or white, and maybe with higher nutrients you dont need such high CO2. Of course I am no scientist and know nothing on the matter.
 
Tom Barr is suggesting that you can forget about nutrients, but is this right?
Yes. He measured the maximum possible nutrient uptake of plants and EI is based on providing more than this, thus you can forget about nutrient levels and concentrate on important controllable and measurable things like CO2 (and light).
 
Jose, my previous post was rather sarcastic => I was a form of criticism of some EI people who IMO much too often blame low CO2 for every other issue in our planted tanks.

As to what ian_m said: Do you know that EI is not any non-limiting method at all? A couple of days ago T.Barr admited this in discussion with me on barrreport.com (see post #22). Also, I would recommend you reading what Paul Krombholz said about PO4 turnover rates in freshwater (you would find many papers on this on web elsewhere from different authors also). According to my experiences plants are able to remove P from water in just few hours after you add it there. And do you think that all plants are able to absorb phosphates (or other nutrients) with the same speed? So you seriously doubt that I can have PO4 deficiency in my tank, although you don't even know what my tank look like! That's strange.
 
I dont think people are getting my point. Im suggesting that defficiencies are a function of the relationship nutrients+CO2, so they can be fixed in two ways. Adding more CO2 or adding more nutrients (even more than EI)

So for example: If you have 15 ppm CO2 and 1 ppm PO4 then say you get GSA. You can fix this problem by adding more PO4 (and keeping CO2 the same) or by adding more CO2 (and keeping PO4 the same). And the same for all other defficiencies.

So if you have 15 ppm CO2 in your tank then maybe if you add 2xEI or 3xEI then your might not run into the problems that you might run into if you only dose1xEI.

Many people Im sure have got to the conclusion and are adding more than EI specially PO4.
 
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So you seriously doubt that I can have PO4 deficiency in my tank, although you don't even know what my tank look like
Yes. The EI values are nutrient levels beyond what a plant needs.

However EI is not set in stone, if you think you need PO4, there is absolutely no harm in adding excess, won't cause algae, but it is probably a waste of good PO4. Try it, watch the plants.

Im suggesting that defficiencies are a function of the relation nutrients+CO2
It can't be lack of nutrients causing deficiencies as you are dosing values beyond any that a plant can use, thus it only leaves CO2 to be the issue.

I had a pump failure once and dosed 1litre of double strength macro into 180litres, giving NO3 at over 300ppm and PO4...well high... for a couple of days before I realise what had happened. No algae, no extra plant growth, fish not concerned only issue was me in having wasted 1litre of solution...:bawling:
 
Sorry, but you're right. I don't get your point ... I don't believe it can be true. According to your theory if I have too low PO4 and some of my plants begin to suffer a lot from P deficiency, then I can solve it just by raising the CO2 level? And what level do you suggest? My dropchecker is yellow-green right now ... my CO2 concentration should be much higher then 15 ppm. What can more CO2 solve in PO4 deficiency? Do you think plants can substitude P element by C element in their metabolism? Also, it seems strange to me how you separate CO2 and nutrients. CO2 is also a nutrient, in the first place! Or do you think CO2 is some supernatural nutrient? Carbon is a nutrient which plants need in much bigger supply then other nutrients, but still it's a nutrient.
 
It can't be lack of nutrients causing deficiencies as you are dosing values beyond any that a plant can use, thus it only leaves CO2 to be the issue.
I had a pump failure once and dosed 1litre of double strength macro into 180litres, giving NO3 at over 300ppm and PO4...well high... for a couple of days before I realise what had happened. No algae, no extra plant growth, fish not concerned only issue was me in having wasted 1litre of solution...

This doesnt proof my theory wrong still. One thing is how much plants consume. Another thing is the levels at which they do better, and this Im sure depends on other things like CO2.
 
According to your theory if I have too low PO4
Whose theory ? How do you know you have low PO4, have you measured levels using laboratory grade tests ? You are dosing EI, you cannot have low PO4, there will always be sufficient, thus plant issues are not due to macro ferts, just leaving CO2 (and light) as the cause of the issues.

As I said, there is no reason why you could not add more PO4 if you want to, but I doubt you are having a PO4 deficiency issue.
 
Yes. The EI values are nutrient levels beyond what a plant needs.
No. The EI values are maybe half of what a fast-growing plant may really need for maximum growth.

Try it, watch the plants.
I'm not any newbie in EI. Do you think I'm a

It can't be lack of nutrients causing deficiencies as you are dosing values beyond any that a plant can use, thus it only leaves CO2 to be the issue.
That's the biggest cliché being repeated again and again without any scientific evidence ... or I would say contrary to all scientific evidences. I can show you many scientific papers stating that for most fast-growing aquatic plants (which tend to have the biggest demands on nutrient uptake) the non-limiting level of CO2 is somewhere around 20-40 ppm (0.5-1 mM) under full sunlight (1500-2000 µmol.m.s.). There's a lot of scientific evidence for this. So contrary to what EI people (or T.Barr) say no one probably needs more then 30 ppm CO2 for non-limiting growth of his plants. And even when you have 10 ppm CO2, most aquatic plants will do just fine.

I had a pump failure once and dosed 1litre of double strength macro into 180litres, giving NO3 at over 300ppm and PO4...well high...
I have another experience: Once I added by mistake nearly 30 ppm PO4 into my tank. The next day I measured only about 5 ppm PO4, and the third day the concentration droped to zero! You may never be sure you have enough nutrients in your tank ... especially with regard to PO4.

PS: Do I need laboratory grade test kit to find out whether I have zero PO4 in my water? When I use some ordinary PO4 test kit, and add a little KH2PO4 in the water sample, and the color turn purple, then I know it works. When I use water sample from my tank, and the color doesn't change, then I know there's no PO4. That's all I need to know. No need to use lab grade tests for this simple test as I don't need to know the exact PO4 concentration ... I just need to know if I have any phosphates in my tank. But it seems you're not able to admit that there can be something in our tanks which can cause some nutrients to change their form (availability). You probably think that if we add nutrients into our tank water, all must obediently remain in available form until the next water change or until our plants use them.
 
This doesnt proof my theory wrong still. One thing is how much plants consume. Another thing is the levels at which they do better, and this Im sure depends on other things like CO2.
Jose, I don't know if I got it yet, but the above comment reminds me of something. Few months ago I did some tests with nutrient uptake, and find out that when the external nutrient concentration in water was 30 ppm NO3, 3 ppm PO4 etc. my plants were able to use up 7 ppm NO3, 0.4 ppm PO4 etc. per week. But when the external concentration was lower (15 ppm NO3, 0.5 ppm PO4) my plants were able to use up only 4 ppm NO3 and 0.2 ppm PO4 per week. So I agree that the real nutrient uptake by plants depens to a great extent on the external concentration of nutrients. Also I read that plants are able to somehow rearrange their uptake mechanisms according to the nutrients which are in least supply. They are not able to do it for all nutrients, only for some of them, but if some of these nutrients are in short supply, the plants can activate some mechanisms for better uptake of these nutrients (for example they can build some enzymes which can extract the nutrients from dissolved or particulate organic matter also). So the Liebig law of the minimum doesn't apply here, because when some nutrient becomes the most limiting, the plants do their best to improve the mechanisms of its uptake, and also they do their best to lower the need for other nutrients! So the plants are actually working hard so that all the nutrients were in some kind of equilibrium. In other words, if they have enough NO3, K, Ca, Mg etc. but too little PO4, they lower the uptake of NO3, K, Ca ... but improve the uptake of PO4. So in the end the plants adapt themselves for optimal uptake rates under given conditions.
 
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I have noticed lately that some of my plants turn white like stayrogen repens and monte carlo. I am double dosing macros and micros. Is there a chance that Iron can become low even with EI?
Yes but I have also heard dosing liquid carbon at high levels can cause some plants to turn white.

As for dosing higher levels of iron I would be careful of adding too much Plantex as your sole source of iron. You can add Fe DTPA and Fe Gluconate to Plantex CSM+B, i.e., CMS+B, Fe Gluconate and DTPA Fe at 4:1:1 ratio by volume or make a solution of say Fe DTPA and Fe Gluconate for daily dosing.

The post ardjuna is referring to is an amazing realization worth reading. I am glad that you and Tom finally got it right regarding non-limiting nutrients. If nothing else, those who always say it's CO2 should take the time to find out more information before they mouth off. As an example, If Jaap would tell us if he doses liquid carbon or not, this might be the problem - not CO2 or EI. That's not to say CO2 isn't vital to plant growth or that there aren't a lot of people that need to improve on their CO2. Because EI can no longer be considered non-limiting under every condition, each situation needs to be considered individually.
 
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